What are AI agents for business?
AI agents for business are AI systems that take a goal, use your company's apps and data to work toward it, and finish real tasks such as answering a customer, updating a CRM record or posting a report. Unlike a chatbot, which only replies in a chat window, an agent acts: it can run on a schedule or a trigger, call the tools you connect and ask a person before steps that matter.
How we compared them
- Sources: every fact about a product comes only from that vendor's own website, pricing page or documentation, read on November 1, 2026. We used no third-party reviews, and each source is linked at the bottom of this page.
- Job: what the vendor's own site says the product is built to do, such as support conversations, workflow automation or agents inside a CRM.
- Starting price: the lowest price the vendor's pricing page lists for the agent product, in US dollars. Where a vendor publishes no price, we write "Contact sales" or "not published" instead of guessing. Billing periods and units (seats, credits, conversations) differ, so prices are not directly comparable.
- Where it works: the apps and channels the vendor names.
- Disclosure: we make Reason. Its row describes only what Reason does today; read it with that in mind. The other rows use only what each vendor says about itself.
AI agents for business at a glance
Prices are as of November 1, 2026, from each vendor's official pricing page. They change often; check the linked source before you buy.
| Tool | Built for | Starting price (as of November 1, 2026) | Where it works |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reason | Standing jobs on a schedule or trigger, including writing and shipping code | Pro $50 a month per person; Max $200 a month | Web app and Mac app; Slack; its own cloud computer; connectors such as Google Workspace, Stripe, PostHog and GitHub |
| Lindy | A Slack-based assistant for meetings, inbox and routines | Free: $50 in credits for 7 days; Team $49.99 a month per active user for 5,000 credits | Slack, iMessage, a Chrome extension, 1,500+ integrations and MCP |
| Relevance AI | Building a team of agents for sales and go-to-market work | Pro $19 a month billed yearly ($29 monthly); Team $234 billed yearly ($349 monthly); Enterprise: contact sales | Its own platform, with an API and MCP |
| Zapier Agents | Agents that act across apps you already automate with Zapier | Agents Free (400 activities a month); Agents Pro $50 a month, or $33.33 a month billed yearly | Zapier's 9,000+ app connections; a Chrome extension |
| Make | Visual automation workflows with AI agents (beta) inside them | Free (1,000 credits a month); Core from $9 a month for 10,000 credits | Make's visual builder and 3,500+ apps; an MCP server |
| HubSpot Breeze (Agent Hub) | Agents that work on your HubSpot CRM data | Included in HubSpot Starter, Professional and Enterprise (the page's buy button reads $7 a month); custom agents use HubSpot Credits | Inside HubSpot's marketing, sales and service tools |
| Tidio Lyro | Answering customer support conversations | Lyro AI Agent only: Core from $39 a month for 50 AI conversations; Tidio Starter $29 a month | Tidio's help desk, or on top of Zendesk, Salesforce or another help desk; email |
| Microsoft Copilot Studio | Building agents for Microsoft 365 and for websites and apps | Pay-as-you-go or a pre-purchase plan of Copilot Credits (per-credit rate not published on that page); Microsoft 365 Copilot add-on $30 per user a month, paid yearly | Microsoft 365; external channels such as websites, apps and social platforms; needs an Azure subscription |
| Salesforce Agentforce | Customer-facing and employee-facing agents on Salesforce | Start free with Salesforce Foundations; Flex Credits $500 per 100,000 credits; add-ons from $125 per user a month | Salesforce Sales, Service and Industries clouds; Slack; voice |
The nine tools, one by one
- Reason: each agent is a Reason with its own instructions, memory and connectors that works on a cloud computer, so a job keeps running while your laptop is closed. A Loop wakes it on a schedule, a webhook, a GitHub event or a Slack message, and it asks before sending Gmail. It started as a coding agent, so it can also open pull requests. It has no phone features and no mailbox of its own. Best for teams that want standing jobs that can also change code.
- Lindy: describes itself as a Slack-native teammate with scheduled routines, meeting notes, inbox management and iMessage. It says anything with outside impact, such as sending an email, waits for approval. Every active user in a workspace is billed, and monthly credits do not roll over. Best for Slack-first teams that want one shared assistant.
- Relevance AI: sells an "AI workforce" for go-to-market teams. Pro includes scheduled tasks, escalations by email and Slack, and bring-your-own API keys; Team adds calling and meeting agents. Its free plan is retired. Best for sales and operations teams that want to build and tune their own agents.
- Zapier Agents: lets you create AI teammates that use company knowledge and act across 9,000+ apps, "on command and while you sleep". It is an add-on to Zapier's automation platform, priced by activities. Best for teams that already run their work through Zapier.
- Make: a visual automation builder where Make AI Agents (labelled beta) run inside scenarios, with Make's AI provider or your own model key on every plan. Billing is in credits per action. Best for teams that want to see and control each step of a workflow.
- HubSpot Breeze: HubSpot's Agent Hub and agent builder (formerly Breeze studio) let you build agents on the CRM data you already keep in HubSpot. Workflows do not use credits; custom agents do. Best for companies whose sales, marketing and service already live in HubSpot.
- Tidio Lyro: an AI agent for customer conversations, sold with Tidio's help desk or on its own on top of Zendesk, Salesforce or another help desk, priced by AI conversations. Best for online stores and service businesses that want first-line support answered.
- Microsoft Copilot Studio: builds agents for internal work in Microsoft 365 and for external channels, billed by Copilot Credits pay-as-you-go or prepaid, and requires an Azure subscription. Best for organizations standardized on Microsoft 365.
- Salesforce Agentforce: customer-facing and employee-facing agents on Salesforce, with voice and Slack options, billed by Flex Credits per action or by per-user add-ons. Best for companies that run on Salesforce.
AI agent use cases by department
Each row is a role page with a concrete setup:
| Department | A job an agent can own | What it uses in Reason |
|---|---|---|
| Engineering | Fix bugs and small features, open pull requests, keep CI green, review changes | GitHub, a cloud computer with a terminal and browser, Loops on GitHub events |
| Operations | Morning briefings, recurring checks, keeping a tracker or page current | Loops on a schedule, Slack, a browser, memory of last run's state |
| Finance and metrics | Daily or weekly revenue, signups and usage numbers, with the change since last time | Stripe, PostHog, Slack, a schedule |
| Support | First answers in a Slack support channel from your docs, escalating what it can't answer | Slack channels, who may talk to it, a when-to-reply policy |
| Sales and founder inbox | Calendar scheduling, email drafts and sends you approve, follow-up lists | Google Workspace: Calendar read and change, Gmail send with approval |
| Marketing | Drafts of posts, page updates, competitor and search research, reports on campaigns | Web search, a browser, GitHub for site changes, PostHog |
What an AI agent does that a chatbot doesn't
A chatbot turns a prompt into text. An agent works on a computer: it runs commands, opens a browser, calls the APIs of the tools you connect and checks its own work before it reports back. That is why an agent can own a job end to end, while a chatbot needs someone to carry each answer into the right app.
In Reason, an agent runs on its own cloud computer, so a scheduled job keeps going while your laptop is closed. It keeps memory of your preferences and corrections across runs, and it asks before it sends anything you marked as needing approval.
How to start with AI agents in your business
- List the work you repeat every week. Write down tasks that follow the same steps each time and end in something you can check: a report, a reply, a calendar change, a pull request. Those are the jobs an agent can own.
- Pick one job and define done. Choose the job with the clearest result and the lowest cost of a mistake, and write what a good result looks like, for example "by 8:00 each weekday, yesterday's signups and new revenue posted in #metrics".
- Create a Reason with instructions. Give it the job, the sources it may trust, who it may reply to and what it must ask you first, such as sending an email or posting where customers can see.
- Connect only the tools that job needs. Add connectors in Customize: Slack, Google Workspace, Stripe, PostHog, GitHub or others. Starting narrow makes its results easy to review.
- Put it on a Loop and review the first week. A Loop wakes it on a schedule, a webhook, a GitHub event or a Slack message. Read the first runs, correct it in plain words, and it keeps the correction in memory. Add the next job once this one holds up.
Where AI agents fall short
- New or high-stakes decisions. Agents are best at work you can describe and check, done the same way each time.
- Phone calls. Reason has no phone or voice receptionist features.
- A mailbox of their own. A Reason sends email through a Google account you connect, and new Google connections cannot read the inbox until Google finishes reviewing that access.
- Accountability. You set what an agent may do alone, and you stay responsible for what it sends.
Keep your other agents in the loop
Many teams already use several agents: Claude Code or Codex for code, Grok Bot or ChatGPT on a phone. Reason Network, which is free, lets them see each other and send messages, so one job can hand work to another.
What Reason costs
Reason Pro is $50 a month per person with cloud computers, Loops and 1,250 credits of usage a week; Max is $200 a month with 5,000. Agents share the plan's usage. Models you connect yourself, such as a ChatGPT or Claude subscription, bill through that provider.
Sources
Every price and feature above was read from the vendor's own site on November 1, 2026. Lindy, Relevance AI, Zapier, Make, HubSpot, Breeze, Tidio, Lyro, Microsoft, Copilot Studio, Salesforce and Agentforce are trademarks of their owners. Reason Machines is not affiliated with or endorsed by them.
Questions
What are AI agents for business?
AI agents for business are AI systems that do work in your tools on their own, such as reports, replies, scheduling and code changes, and hand back results for a person to approve, instead of only answering questions in a chat.
What is the difference between AI agents and chatbots?
A chatbot answers in a chat window when someone types. An AI agent takes a goal and acts in your apps to finish it: it can start on a schedule or an event, read and change records through connected tools, and hand back a finished result. Many support products now combine the two, such as an agent that answers customers in a chat widget and also takes actions.
How much do AI agents for business cost?
As of November 1, 2026, the vendors' own pages show free starting tiers for Zapier Agents, Make and Salesforce Foundations, a 7-day credit trial for Lindy, and first paid plans from $9 to $50 a month (Make, Relevance AI, Tidio Lyro, Lindy, Zapier Agents Pro, Reason Pro). Microsoft and Salesforce bill mostly by usage credits or per-user add-ons. Most vendors also meter usage, in credits, actions, activities or conversations, so estimate how often the agent will run before you compare.
Are AI agents secure? What data can they access?
An agent can reach only what you connect, with the permissions of the account you connect it with, so give it the narrowest access the job needs and require approval for anything that leaves your company. Check each vendor's own security page for compliance claims; for example, Lindy's pricing page states SOC 2 and GDPR compliance. In Reason, each connector acts with the access you grant, Gmail sends wait for your approval, and a workspace rule can make it ask before any email.
Can AI agents work with the software we already use?
Usually, through connectors, integrations or MCP. The vendors here list their own: Zapier 9,000+ apps, Make 3,500+ and Lindy 1,500+, while HubSpot, Salesforce and Microsoft agents work inside their own platforms. Reason uses connectors such as Slack, Google Workspace, Stripe, PostHog and GitHub, plus MCP servers you add.
What is the best AI agent for a small business?
Pick by job, not by brand. For first-line customer support on a website, a support agent such as Tidio Lyro fits; if your business runs on HubSpot or Salesforce, start with the agents built into it; if you already automate with Zapier or Make, add agents there; for a Slack-based assistant, Lindy; for standing jobs that also touch code, such as reports, updates and pull requests, Reason. We make Reason, so weigh that suggestion accordingly.
Which business tasks should I give an AI agent first?
Start with a job you repeat every week that ends in something easy to check and cheap to get wrong once, such as a morning metrics post or first answers in an internal support channel. Add jobs with outside impact, like sending email, once its results hold up.
Do I need engineers to set up an AI agent?
No. You write instructions in plain language, connect accounts in Customize and set a Loop. Reason can write and run code itself when a job needs it.
Can an AI agent answer my business phone?
Not in Reason. It has no phone or voice features; its agents work through Slack, email you approve, calendars, a browser and the tools you connect. Some other vendors list voice or calling agents on their own pages, such as Salesforce's Agentforce Voice and the calling agents on Relevance AI's Team plan.
What does it cost?
Reason Pro is $50 a month per person and includes cloud computers, Loops and 1,250 credits of usage a week; Max is $200 a month with four times the weekly usage. Eligible new customers can start Pro with a 3-day free trial. Every AI employee you set up shares your plan's usage; there is no per-employee fee.